Also, if the essence is fasting, why did they need to go see a shaman in Peru?
The scientists would ignore all the diagnosis and individual examination the shaman did, and the study would probably have the participants take a specific amount of a single specific herb on a single specific schedule. Basically, they'd take all the complexities of the alternative medical system and tried to distill it down to a one-size-fits-all regimen.
Then, after it undoubtedly showed no effect, they'd proclaim the shaman is a fraud and that nothing he does really works.
I mean, really, are you going to sit there and tell me that its more logical that all the alternative medical systems developed over thousands of years are bullshit, than the possibility that modern medicine has gaps covered by these other medical systems, that can't/won't be filled using the scientific method, wrapped and perverted as it is by the hubris and single-minded culture of the doctors and scientists using it?
Gee, I wonder why rational people are skeptical of that.
And to answer your question, no, I do not believe that alternative health systems "developed" over thousands of years work. If they work, then they're medicine. We only use the term alternative health to define things that are too magical to have their effects show up when studied using the scientific method. And barring the ability to collect some reliable data on their efficacy, then yes, they're bullshit by default. What other reliable framework for evaluating them could I possibly have?
I know a guy. He's a healer. He can do things that Western science has absolutely no idea about. In point of fact several people who were diagnosed with cancer have worked with him and afterwards were no longer diagnosed with cancer.
This is factual.
Yet good luck getting people in general to take this seriously. No one wants to hear it. My mom's neighbour had breast cancer, she beat it with conventional medicine, more power to her. But she refused even to think about anything outside of the established system. For her it worked.
Personally, I'm very frustrated. I come from a strongly scientific background, so when I meet a person who can fucking cure fucking cancer I would really like to see the scientific establishment take that seriously.
But whatever. I can take some consolation that at least my family and I don't have to worry about cancer, even if I can do nothing to change the zeitgeist of society.
For those of you wondering why this guy wouldn't try to spread the word, well, first of all he does! He talks to anyone he meets and is not shy about it at all. The limiting factor is the people who don't want to hear about crazy shit.
(P.S. If you have cancer and want to talk to my healer friend I can put you in touch. He's in Europe now and kind of retired, and I haven't spoken to him in a year or so, but if you truly need help and feel that this guy is "the one" you can contact me and I'll see about putting you in touch.)
Well, no, it's not. From my perspective, this is yet another random anecdote from the Internet. It's no different to me than someone saying they can turn base metals into gold, hear the voice of God directly, or travel to alternate dimensions.
And even from YOUR perspective, you have no idea what's fact and what's not. Apparently this healer is so powerful that your family need not worry about cancer. But I suspect you have little hard evidence of any actual healing, no proposed mechanisms that make any sense, and no ability to reproduce any of this.
The amazing thing about the scientific method is that it gives us a framework to separate claims from reality. If you have a better framework then please share it. But there seems to be little value to a framework built on "I know a guy, trust me." We had that for thousands of years. Health care under such a framework was pretty rough.
The shaman might tell you, I look into their eyes and if I see a slight yellowness I know X. Then I measure their pulse and that tells me Y. So based on that I prescribe medicine A at dose B.
Now if someone designed a study that first separated people into a category where both X and Y are true, and then gave only those people the medicine the shaman recommended, you'd have a real test. But this isn't done.
Humanity has produced great things before the scientific method existed, agriculture, smelting, sea travel, etc., including the scientific method, itself! How can you reconcile this fact with your proclamation that anything related to medicine, a body of knowledge produced from the same people at the same period of time is all bullshit?
"When you kick a stone the energy for its resulting movement comes from your foot. When you kick a dog..."
Complex living systems with scads of "free" energy are not susceptible to the same formal method that revealed and is still revealing Physics.
We need a new science.
I have a feeling that the _magical_ Peruvian cure is based on eating blister beetles, which is a popular treatment in Chinese medicine. Apparently, chemicals these bugs make could be beneficial in treating certain kinds of cancer. There are a few researches going on on that front.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24733674
http://www.academia.edu/1279793/Antitumor_Activity_of_Mylabr...
I see you want more data, but, unfortunately, I cannot provide you with any other details. I don't like your tone and would love to close this thread. Thank you.